


she makes me so cold

by lucielwrites



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Lena Luthor Needs a Hug, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Sad Kara Danvers, Sad Lena Luthor, Slow Burn Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor, also that no noncere stuff doesnt exist either so yeah, i havent watched this season so if i fuck things up u know why, lena moving away to deal with her problems is my favourite lena, the whole crisis stuff doesnt happen here
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-20
Updated: 2020-06-11
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:02:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 13,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24287068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucielwrites/pseuds/lucielwrites
Summary: unable to handle her anger towards kara and the rest of her friends, lena disappears completely. but when a calamity hits and the world needs saving once again, lena has to step up and brave her feelings in order to save the people she (unfortunately) still loves.
Relationships: Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor
Comments: 79
Kudos: 351





	1. lena luthor's ending

Lena Luthor disappears on a Sunday. 

It’s just after a game night, and although it’s the last thing she wants to do, she’s there. She’s there, a bottle of wine resting on shoulder, smile strained. She’s there, with all of her friends, trying her damned hardest. She’s there, right beside Kara - as she always is - as they win round after round again, Lena’s intelligence never once failing her. She’s there, watching as they all smile and joke around, laughing at one another. She’s right there, real and tangible, sitting almost too close to Kara and talking with Alex and smiling at J’onn. 

God, she hates that even after everything – the absolute hell that she’s been put through, the lies her so called friends told her every single day, the complete and utter betrayal from Kara – she's still there. She hates that she doesn’t know who she hates more. Kara, for crawling her way into Lena’s heart and then fucking destroying her, or Lena herself for once again being blind to the web of lies and deceit her loved ones spun. 

It’s then and there, in the middle of once more being by Kara’s side and still talking with Alex and smiling at J’onn, feeling the righteous anger and white hot hatred burn within her, that she decides she has to leave. 

She can’t be here, not tonight and not ever again. She can’t look at Kara’s face without wanting to hurt her so irreparably, so thoroughly like she did, for years, to Lena. She can’t sit here and talk with Alex without knowing that the moment it comes out that Lena knows Kara is Supergirl is the moment where once again Alex will look at her like she’s the villain, like she’s a Luthor. She can’t look at Nia or Kelly without wondering if they know, if they knew before Lena did, if they helped Kara hide herself from Lena. She can’t smile at J’onn without knowing that for all of his Martian powers and his empathetic thoughts, he could never understand the depths of her heartbreak and despair, without knowing that he played an active role in keeping her in the dark, in distrusting her. She can’t call all these people her friends without knowing that they willingly deceived, that they wanted to keep her in the dark and went about it every single day as if they didn’t know what betrayal did to her family, to her. 

She can’t stay here, in this city, with all her memories. 

Her office. That couch, her and Kara’s space, filled with interviews and lunches and tears and hugs and raw honesty and promises. The balcony, where Supergirl often visited her late in the night, sometimes understanding and sometimes judgmental and sometimes never there when it mattered. L-Corp, where Jess will ask too many questions, where she first met Kara, where her whole new life began. 

Noonan’s, where Kara and Alex would rope her into having lunch just to get her out of her office or having a quick coffee on her busy days. 

Catco, the company she basically bought for Kara, where James lied to her every day, not only about Kara’s secret but his own as well, where Kara gave her that planner on her first day, where Kara and Nia and James all work, where they’re all unavoidable. 

The street that Kara lives on, the one she drives past far too often. 

The DEO building, hiding in plain sight as a goddamn skyscraper. 

Her apartment, where James laid in her bed, where Kara raided her fridge, where Supergirl visited when she wasn’t working late at the office, where she kept framed photographs of all the people she loved. 

She’s got no choice, really. She has to leave. All of it, the memories, the people themselves, all of it is too much to handle right now. She feels too much and yet so little at the same time, and she knows that that is a dangerous path for a Luthor to go down. Especially, especially with a Super involved. She thinks she understands now, how Lex must have felt when it all went down between him and Superman, between him and Clark Kent. 

God, she misses him. Even if at the end Lex was nothing more than a shell of the man he used to be, she still mourns him, still loves him despite what she did to him. The real, physical loss of her brother, the person she always secretly hoped would one day redeem himself, feels like someone has cut one of her limbs off. The harsh, cold sting of losing Lex hurts almost as bad as the knowledge that although Lex tried to hurt her one last time by revealing that Kara was Supergirl, he granted her a mercy. With his last breath, he gave her the truth. She knows Lex meant it to harm her, but as they say, the truth will set you free. 

And she was free, now. There was nothing left to tie her down, to set her back, to hold her down. No crisis to solve, no villains to catch, nothing. No one to tell her ‘no’, no one to accuse her of being a Luthor, no one to save and protect. For the first time since Lex had gone to jail, Lena was truly free. She could go anywhere in the whole wide world. She could do anything she had ever wanted to, and no one could her tear her down anymore, because she’d already been torn down by those who mattered most. She had nothing to lose now. 

Lex may have been evil, and a villain, and quite possibly the worst person to ever grace this Earth, but in the end, he gave her this freedom, this truth. In a roundabout way, as much as she's angry at him she’s still at least grateful for that. 

So Lena makes plans to not just leave, but disappear. She buys a plot of land on the coast of Ireland, a place that Kara will never find her, will never even think to look for her. She transfers a modest amount of money to an offshore account, and then funnels that money into an account under L. Kieran, enough to sustain her for a while but nothing like the billions she has stored and locked away. She donates the rest of her money to various charities and transfers enough money into Sam’s bank account that Ruby’s grandchildren will never have to worry about anything and gives a raise to every single L-Corp employee until there’s nothing left in Lena Luthor’s account. She transfers the sole ownership of L-Corp over to Jess, her long-term assistant and the only person she trusts to make sure L-Corp doesn’t go down the wrong path without her. She books a commercial flight to Ireland for the earliest hour in the morning at the National City airport, wears the most casual clothes she’s ever owned, and just fucking disappears. 

Like the ocean, Lena Luthor’s life washes away, and in with the tide comes Lena Kieran’s new life.


	2. where is she? (lena, lena)

It feels like a regular Sunday. The sun shines just as bright as it does every other day, re-energizing and re-powering Kara for another day. Crime is at a low for once in National City, meaning both Kara and Supergirl have the day off and a chance at a brief respite. There are no deadlines to try and hurry to beat, no leads to catch up on and chase down, no big stories to follow or report on yet. All her friends and family are safe, happy, relaxing for once now that there are no big threats to defeat and world that needs urgent saving. 

It’s a normal Sunday, the best one Kara’s had in a long, long while, if she’s being honest with herself. The usual rigidness that contorts her body is gone, the tense shoulders loosened and worried frown transformed into a content smile. She doesn’t need to stand up straight, be a symbol, be a hero today. There’s no punching or fighting, no flying around and rushing frantically, no need to be a savior. She’s allowed to just sink into her couch, pull her legs up beside her, take a long sip of her coffee, and breathe. 

That’s her favorite part of Sundays like these. She doesn’t have to be Super, she can just be human. Ordinary. She can go for a hike and take in the nature and not have to worry that she’s wasting her time because there’s always someone to save, something to do to help others. She can laze around in bed all afternoon and not change out of her pajamas and not think about her destiny or her sacrifices. She can work on personal projects, like the book she’s writing, without worrying that something more important needs her attention. She’s not Kara Zor-El, Kryptonian, alien, Supergirl, Champion of Earth. On regular Sundays like these, she’s just Kara, just human for at least one day or her life. 

But this Sunday, with its sunny brightness and cloudless skies, turns out to be anything but normal for Kara. 

It starts with an innocuous call from Alex, asking if Kara’s heard from Lena since their weekly game night two nights ago. 

“No, I haven’t. I just kinda assumed she’d be busy with L-Corp stuff. Why?” Kara asks, setting her mug, the one with little dogs all over it that Nia had gotten her for her birthday, onto her coffee table. 

“It’s just that according to HR she’s apparently severed her ties with the DEO.” Alex sighs through the phone. 

“What? What do you mean she ‘severed her ties’ with the DEO?” Kara immediately jumps up from her curled-up position on her couch, her signature crinkle forming as confusion colored her face. 

“I don’t know, I thought maybe she had said something to you, that’s why I was hoping you had heard from her.” 

“No, I hadn’t. I’ll go check up on her and see what’s going on.” Kara frowns, using her superspeed to change into her uniform. 

“Kara, wait. Are you going to see her as Kara or as Supergirl?” Alex questions. 

“As Supergirl.” Alex sighs at Kara’s response. 

“Kara, you have to tell her soon. You do know that, right?” 

“Of course I do, Alex. Just, obviously now isn’t the best time if something’s going on with her.” Kara huffs, running a hand through her golden hair as she walks closer to her apartment’s window. 

“If something really is going on, Kara, I think now is the best time.” Alex tries to reason, but Kara isn’t having it. 

“No, look, she’s just lost Lex, and she’s struggling to get L-Corp back on track. She doesn’t need more Super-Luthor drama, she just needs her friend right now. Her human friend, Alex, not a superhero one.” The frustration and guilt Kara carries in her voice clearly shows that this is a train of thought she’s gone down many times recently, and with a frown, Alex decides to leave it for another day. 

“Okay, Kara, just go make sure she’s alright, yeah?” Alex breathes deeply into the receiver, worried about both Kara and Lena. 

“I will, don’t worry too much, Alex.” Kara tries to reassure her sister. 

And with that Kara hangs up the phone, immediately flying out her window and in the direction of L-Corp to go and talk to Lena. 

\- 

Kara lands softly on Lena’s balcony, her boots thudding on the ground and causing the main occupant of the room to spin around in their chair. Kara’s already in her Supergirl stance, sunny smile on her face, and the beginnings of Lena’s name bursting out of her mouth when she realizes it’s not Lena, standing up from the office chair and hurriedly walking towards Kara. It’s Jess, Lena’s long-term assistant and friend, who immediately strides towards her, both fear and exhaustion coloring her face despite the early hour of the morning. An expected look from Lena, for sure, but from Jess? It makes Kara worry. 

“Supergirl! Oh, thank God, please, please tell me you know where Lena is?” 

And that one sentence sends a jolt of fear across Kara’s whole body. Her heart begins to beat haphazardly in her chest, and her senses become ten times stronger in the moment. It’s as if all of sudden she’s lost the ability to block the sounds of the city out. Near her apartment a group of teenage boys yell in cohesion as they beat a level in the video game they were playing, car engines hum like bees buzzing in her ears on the streets below her, a woman screams at her daughter for not being home before curfew on the other side of town, at Catco a man practices saying I love you for the first time, at L-Corp she hears the hundreds of feet marching below, the whispers and rumors being spread. 

It’s all too much for her. All she can think about is _Lena, missing. Lena, where? Lena, taken. Lena, Lena, Lena._

(A small traitorous part of her brain whispers _Lena, dead._ ) 

And just like that, her whole-body freezes in place, her shoulders immediately becoming tense, the color draining from her face, transforming from bright and sunny into a pale, sickly version of herself. The cheery smile that she constantly adorned immediately washes away in a fear-stricken frown, her eyes going wide as her mind races. 

Her mind stays on that same continuous loop of _Lena, Lena, Lena._

“Supergirl! Supergirl, can you hear me?” Jess’s frantic voice rings out against the haze Kara’s mind has become filled with. 

“Uh, y-yes, I can hear you. I’m sorry, what... what's going on?” Kara blinks and stutters as she tries to refocus on what Jess is saying, tearing herself away from her tangled thoughts. Focus, Kara, she tells herself. 

“Ms. Luthor has disappeared.” Jess states, running her hands over her face. 

The tense, rigid set to Jess’s shoulders is not a new sight to Kara, who has seen Jess constantly go above and beyond for Lena over the last four years. But the way utter exhaustion frames her posture, the way the unseen weight upon her shoulders has seemingly increased, the way worry and fear that lines her face, the slight bewilderment that Jess tries to hide behind her steely gaze – the same gaze Lena herself often held while at work – is an entirely new image of Jess that she has never ever borne witness to before. It makes Kara feel even more on edge than before. 

“I awoke to a text message this morning from Ms. Luthor, telling me she needed me to come into work today for something important.” Kara files this information away, silently. Lena doesn’t text anyone – ever, not her friends nor her employees – with Kara being the only exception ever to that rule. 

“But when I got here, her office was empty. I tried calling her, but she had left her phone in the drawer of her desk.” Kara files this information away silently too, more than aware that Lena never went anywhere without her phone, just in case L-Corp ever needed her or an emergency occurred whilst she was away. 

“And then,” Jess let out a harsh breath, “and then, I saw this.” She spoke, holding up a large document for Kara to see. 

“What’s this?” Kara said as she grabbed the document from Jess’s hands, quickly skimming over all the fine print with the use of superspeed. She brushed past all of the legal and business jargon she didn’t understand, until she finally got to the last page and gaped at what she saw. 

There, in large bold letters, was written: THEREBY, LENA LUTHOR TRANSFERS SOLE OWNERSHIP OF L-CORP AND HER MAJORITY SHARES TO JESSICA HUANG, EFFECTIVE IMMEDAITELY UPON THE SIGNING OF THESE PAPERS. 

“Yesterday, Ms. Luthor asked me to sign some papers and I-I didn’t think, I just signed because we’ve been so busy trying to keep investors from pulling out and employees on board after everything that’s happened, so I just signed them without looking because well, Lena needed me to and I just didn’t realize that I was signing papers to make me the goddamned CEO, and I just... I just... I don’t even have a business degree for heaven’s sake! And Ms. Luthor isn’t even here to coach or guide me and Jesus I’m out of my depths, and oh my God, Lena. Lena is missing.” Jess clutches at her hair, her stress apparent as she paces the length of Lena’s - or well, her office, now, she supposes - back and forth, her rambling finally crawling to a slow as she turns to look at Kara and speaks. 

“Just...just what the actual hell is going on, Supergirl?” 

“I...” Kara doesn’t even know what to say. First Lena cuts ties with the DEO, and then Lena willingly gives up on L-Corp? All of this just doesn’t make any sense to her. Where is Lena? What is happening? Kara’s worry for Lena increases tenfold at the revelations and she itches to just fly out of there immediately and start the manhunt to search for Lena herself, but she knows just by looking at Jess that the now newly-minted CEO is crumbling under the pressure and stress that has been placed upon her so suddenly, so Kara steels her gaze and places her hands on her hips in her signature pose, hoping to inspire some Supergirl confidence in Jess. 

“Okay, it’s okay, Jess. We’re going to find Ms. Luthor and bring her back, okay? I don’t know what’s going on, but I do know that Ms. Luthor has placed her upmost faith in you. She wouldn’t hand over L-Corp to just anyone, and you and I both know that. Until we get Ms. Luthor back, she’s trusting you to look after L-Corp and all its employees, and I know that seems like a monumental task but Ms. Luthor chose you for a reason, Jess, and I know that she fully believes in your capabilities. She knows you can handle this, so prove her right, okay? Just until we get her back. Can you do that?” It takes a few moments for her words to sink in, but at the end of Supergirl’s speech, Jess seems to take a few deep breathes and relaxes just the tiniest bit. 

“Okay.” Jess nods and gives Kara a grateful smile. 

“Okay.” Kara beams back. “I’m going to start the search for Ms. Luthor now. If you come across anything useful, Jess, you just let me know.” 

As Kara turns around and flies off the balcony, she lets the fake grin fall from her face, a somber and perturbed look replacing it. With her speech to Jess replaying in her mind, the small traitorous part of her brain whispers: _what if you never get Lena back?_

\- 

“Alex!” Kara yells as she flies into the DEO, a rush of wind accompanying her arrival, making a few stray papers fly off into the air. A few agents glance curiously at the alien as she storms into Alex’s office, wondering what has happened in order for that look of utter confusion and prevalent loss to be present on the Super’s face. 

“Kara, hey, what’s going on? Did you talk to Lena?” Alex murmurs as she looks up from the reports she was reading on the latest anti-alien protest that occurred in National City. 

“She’s gone, Alex.” Kara says, fighting back the tears that have been threatening to leave her eyes ever since she first heard Jess ask her where Lena was. 

“Kara? What do you mean?” Alex sets down her reports, her attention laser-focused now on her very obviously distraught sister. 

“She-” Kara chokes out, pacing around a little as she tries to force out the right words. “Lena. She-she's just, she’s just gone, Alex!” Kara cries out, tears spilling down her face. The more she thinks about Lena, the harder it gets to keep the tears at bay. 

“She gav-gave away L-Corp, a-and cuts her ties to the DEO and...” Kara hiccups, “and her apartment is completely empty! I-I checked everywhere, Alex, all over National City and I-I can’t... I can’t find her heartbeat at all anymore. Her assistant doesn’t even know what’s going on, and neither do I and I’m her best friend!” Alex quickly makes her way over to Kara, wrapping her arms around her and holding her sister close as she sobs out the words. 

“W-where is she, Alex? I just... I just feel like something is so terribly, terribly wrong. W-what is going on, Alex?” Kara whispers, clinging to Alex as she cries louder. 

“Shh, Kara. It’s gonna be okay, we’ll find her, it’ll be alright, we’re gonna get her back, okay? Just breathe, Kara. Breathe with me, now, it’s okay.” Alex whispers, rubbing Kara’s back and trying to sooth her worries momentarily. 

“We’re going to find her, Kara.” Alex vows to her, but the small traitorous part of Kara’s mind invades her thoughts and whispers: _“what if you find her too late?"_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> second part is up, normally i dont update this quickly but i was inspired by all of the kudos and comments so :) next chapter im gonna try and write sams reaction and definitely write about lenas new life far away from all of the superfriends, so enjoy! 
> 
> also, none of my chapters are beta read so if there are any mistakes let me know and i'll fix them


	3. checklist

When Lena first steps into Ireland, into her life as Lena Kieran, her first thought is ‘fuck, it’s cold here.’ It’s not the most eloquent of thoughts for when she’s quite literally leaving everything and everyone she’s ever known behind her, but well, it’s the least hurtful, angry or sad thought she has as she steps off the plane and back into her homeland. 

She’s bundled up in her thickest coat, scarf wrapped tightly around her neck, beanie settled firmly on her head, a pair of thick sweatpants providing that little bit of extra warmth and still, it’s not enough to halt the biting cold of the night that settles in her bones as she meanders her way through the airport and into the first taxi she can find. Her clothes are easily the cheapest she’s ever bought, and she finds that she really loves the fact that she looks nothing like a Luthor or a CEO. 

As she steps out of the taxi and back into the freezing cold night, she looks upon her new home, the basis for her new life, with a sense of trepidation. All at once, it hits her. It’s here, that Lena Kieran will truly become alive. As soon as she opens that door, her old life as a Luthor is truly, truly over. As much as being a Luthor has hurt her, has brought misery and betrayal into her life, being a Luthor has also guided her, shaped her into the woman she is today. Who is she, without the Luthor name attached to her like a ball and chain? Who is she, without the money and the access and the notoriety? Who is she, without the weight of her family’s sins, without the guilt and the shame they’ve lorded over her for years? 

She supposes the real question is: _who does she want to be?_

And that’s the crux of it all, really, she thinks as she continues to stare at the front door of her new home. For the first time in her whole life, she has the freedom to make her own choices. So, who does she want to be, now that she can be anyone she wants to be, now that she doesn’t have to adhere to the pressure or expectations everyone else – her family, her peers, her competitors, the public, even her so-called friends – has been placing upon her for so long now. 

It’s terrifying, this knowledge that she doesn’t have to do anything she doesn’t want to do anymore, that she doesn’t have to play pretend and be someone she doesn’t want to be anymore. It goes against everything she’s ever been taught, everything she’s ever had to do in order to live out the life expected of her. With a start, she realizes that this decision to start a new life is the first decision she’s made in so long she can’t even remember the last time she decided to do something for herself and nobody else. 

Kar- _Supergirl_ wormed her way into Lena’s heart with her deception, even though Lena had tried to keep her walls up. Supergirl had basically forced Lena into being part of their rag-tag group of friends, to further deceive and keep an eye on her. She was forced to take over L-Corp because of Lex’s sins even though it was the last thing she had ever wanted to do. She was forced from her relationship with Jack in order to save the company. She was forced to leave her home of Metropolis, forced to leave her admittedly few loved ones, forced to move to the other side of the country because that was what the board had decided was best. 

All those forced decisions, decisions made by others, those decisions had only caused her so much pain and heartbreak and deep, guttural sadness. The pressure to succeed and be better, the constant weight of the Luthor name, the expectations of others pushing her down, all of it was forced upon her. And now, standing here in front of the door that will open to her new home, she’s not forced to do anything. 

It, at long last, dawns on her; the realization that for the first time in a long while, she’s truly _free_. And as she places her hand on the doorknob, finally ready to step inside of her new home and shed her old life as Lena Luthor behind, she promises herself one thing: she’ll never have her freedom taken away from her ever again. 

\+ 

Her new house is essentially a major insult, a massive _fuck you_ to everything she used to know and be. 

After her little revelation outside the front door, she decides rather likes it, if only for that reason. 

Her home is no longer a luxurious penthouse that is one of the finest properties National City could offer her, but a medium sized cottage located on a little hillside near the local beach. No longer is she living in the hustle and bustle of a city that never sleeps, but in the relatively secluded outskirts of a relatively unknown town. Her home is no longer cold and sterile, bland and minimalistic, but rather woodsy and cozy, even without any of her furnishings inside of it. It’s not stifling or restrictive, not imposing or harsh to look at it. In fact, it’s the complete opposite. It’s quaint, opening to the lounge area that contains a fireplace, with small steps leading up to the kitchen and pantry areas. It has large windows that double as folding doors, leading out to the garden which is currently a mess of dirt and mud-stained grass. A staircase leads up to the second floor, in which the awfully small bathroom and Lena’s bedroom reside. Lena’s bedroom currently contains the only furniture in the entire house: her ridiculously expensive bed (that she couldn’t bear to let go of) that faces the large windows opposite. 

All in all, she knows that it needs a little work. The wood beneath her feet is old and worn down, the windows and doors become creaky when she opens and closes them, her backyard is frankly atrocious and the basement underneath the stairs that she’s too afraid to even look at, let alone touch, needs to be dealt with as well. But as she looks around, she knows that she’s more content to be here, living in her humble home in which Lena _Kieran_ can settle down in for the rest of her life, than she ever was living in a penthouse befitting and expected of the rich and wealthy Luthors. 

It was already late when she got here, but it’s far later now, and although her body won’t adjust to the different time-zone anytime soon, she begins to get ready for bed. The only things she brought to Ireland were the clothes on her back, that stupidly expensive bed of hers, and a small duffle bag filled with a singular change of clothes, toiletries, a little stack of cash and a brand-new, top of the chain computer. She has no furniture, no more than two sets of clothes, no food or storage, no cable or internet, nothing. So, despite her not being the slightest bit tired, she tucks her things away, shoving her duffle bad underneath her bed and settles into her thick, woolly blankets and tries as hard as she can to sleep, knowing that she’s got more than a few monumental tasks ahead her tomorrow. 

After all, tomorrow is the day she truly begins her new life. 

\+ 

When she first awakes, she’s confused and more than a little annoyed, eyes blinking blearily and face scrunching up in displeasure. God, she feels like shit. She’s still so, so tired despite just waking up, her whole body feels utterly lethargic for some reason and the bright sun disrupting her sleep surely isn’t helping anyone. Why the hell didn’t she close her curtains last night? 

She groans loudly as she sits up, rubbing the sleep off her face and stretching languidly, back arched and eyes closed. 

It’s then - and only then - as she opens her eyes, that she remembers where the hell she is. 

Flashes of the last forty-eight hours - arranging her affairs, getting on the plane, having a slight breakdown, finally settling into her new home for the night - slowly come back to her as she lets her gaze wonder around her new room. 

“Right,” She mumbles, running a hand through her mess bed-hair as she gets out of bed. It’s just after dawn, she notes distantly, as she trudges down the stairs in search of the kitchen. She forgets momentarily that the house lacks, quite literally, anything. In her still half-asleep/half-awake state, she flings open the pantry, fully expecting to find her favorite brand of coffee sitting on the shelves. She blinks at the emptiness in front of her, and then lets her head bang loudly against the pantry door. 

_"Fuck!"_ She yells, letting out a tremendous sigh. If she weren’t so desperate for a goddamned coffee, she might’ve laughed at her predicament, but instead she lets out a few more choice swearwords before trudging back up the stairs to get ready. 

\+ 

_First things first, Lena,_ she thinks to herself as she gets dressed into one of the two outfits she brought to Ireland with her and heads out the door, ready for the walk into town. 

1\. ~~Get some godforsaken coffee.~~ Buy an internet router. 

While Lena Kieran may have a bank account and a passport, she does not have the many other official papers and documents she will need in order to live out her new life in Ireland, and this is the precise reason she brought a state-of-the-art laptop with her and not a new phone. After all, she can’t just appear out of thin air, so she needs something to forge her documents with, but she can’t do that without any internet. 

The first thing she notices is that it’s still fucking freezing outside. God, she swears she’s never been this cold ever, but maybe she had gotten too used to the nice, sunny National City weather. She’s half surprised it’s not bloody snowing but decides to not jinx it and silently begins to pray that it doesn’t snow on her way to and from town. 

The second thing she notices is that it’s a long fucking walk to town, far longer than she’d thought it would be. She starts off the beaten path, heading down through her front yard and a seemingly unused field, but for the most part of the journey there’s a singular road she has to follow. It’s all too easy, until she realizes the sheer number of hills she must walk up and down just in order to make it into town. She doesn’t even know how far she has left until she reaches her destination, but she curses herself all the while as she huffs and puffs, her lungs far more sore then they had any right to be. 

The third thing she notices, once she finally reaches town, is that it’s so much more quiet here than anywhere else she’s ever been. Of course, realistically, she knows that a small town off the coast of Ireland is bound to be less noisy then one of the busiest towns in America in which she has spent the last four years residing in, but still, it both startles and settles her as she walks further into town. 

There’s a rather large plaza, and it’s there in which she finds the small electronics store. There's not many people milling about, and her every step and breathe feels like it echoes into the store. The silence is a refreshing reprieve from the cacophony of thoughts that consistently bounces around in her head, and yet it unnerves her, makes her feel like something is ready to pounce on her, like around the corner is a catastrophe waiting to happen and the silence is just the calm before the storm emerges. 

Distantly, as she finds a suitable router and sets off to also buy a decent phone after realizing she’ll need a phone number for her documents, she thinks that that thought is probably not normal, that it’s probably another sign that she’s not okay. Even more distantly, she realizes that she probably needs to go and see a goddamned therapist, but she puts those thoughts in the very back of her mind as she walks out of the store and back into the frigid cold, beginning the long, long walk back home. 

It’s lunch time when she gets back, and the sun has begun its descent back into night by the time she manages to set up her goddamned internet. As a _supposed_ genius who can hack into government agencies that aren’t even meant to exist, the fact that a stupid internet router almost defeated her is not something she’s proud to admit, but in her jetlagged state, she’s honestly just glad she got it done. The actual falsifying of her documents and official papers takes far, far less time – it turns out creating a fake citizenship certificate and driver’s license is much easier than people would think, and thus Lena Kieran becomes a real person, with everything she needs to prove it. 

2\. The second thing Lena needs to do is buy some goddamned furniture. 

Lena sits on the floor of her living room, back against the wall, with her laptop sitting on her knees as she indulges in her greatest yet most guilty pleasure: online shopping. She won’t admit it, but the real reason why she didn’t buy a fully furnished home is because Lena absolutely loves online shopping. It’s a well-known fact that Lena loves to create things. From building with robots with L- with her brother, to designing new technology to making full suits of amour, Lena is a creator at heart. If she can build it, design it, make it, transform it, the chances are that she’ll love it. House designing is no different. 

Besides, this is her forever home. A safe place for her, a new life. Her home can’t be cold and impersonal or designed by someone else, just like her old life was cold and impersonal and designed for her by someone else. This is _hers_ , and _hers only._

So Lena spends hours online shopping. She buys a typical steel fridge and tons of magnets to go with it. She buys the cheapest box of cutlery she can find. She scours four entire websites’ worth of couches until she founds the softest, most comfortable brown couch she’s ever seen and she buys a leather armchair too just because. She buys a fluffy white rug and a stupid doormat that says ‘hi. I'm mat’. She buys a goddamn coffee maker. She buys a regular sized TV and a dark oak wood TV stand to go with it. She buys a small bookshelf to go in her bedroom and a wine-rack to go in the kitchen. She buys two matching bedside tables and a reading lamp. She buys a shit-ton of glow-in-the-dark stars and tries really, really hard not to think about that too in depth. She buys a heater for the godforsaken cold. She buys a coat rack and another small table to out by the front door and iron chairs and a table for her backyard. She pays for everything to be express delivered to her the next day and by the time she’s done it’s well into the night and she’s so drained from the day, from the long trek to and from town and the jetlag and the constant phone calls and the work it took just to make her identity that it doesn’t even cross her mind to eat dinner (not an unusual occurrence for her, but still). Instead she just barely manages to stomp up the stairs and passing out the moment she falls straight into bed, not even bothering to undress. 

3\. The third thing Lena needs to do is buy some food, like immediately. 

When she awakes on her second day in Ireland, she doesn’t feel as dead on her feet as she did the day before, despite her long day. She’s still jetlagged for sure, and the tiredness still weighs on her bones as she gets ready, but it’s not nearly as bad as it was. Instead, as she prepares to receive all the things she ordered last night, she just feels plain _ravenous._ It feels like it’s been years since she last ate, instead of just three or so days. 

_God_ , she thinks to herself, _I really need to work on that._

And once again, Lena makes it halfway down the stairs before she realizes that she has absolutely no food, whatsoever. And once again, Lena lets out a loud groan before she yells the loudest _‘fuck’_ she can manage as she trudges further down the stairs to wait for all her items to arrive. 

It takes an hour of Lena sitting on the floor whilst mindlessly setting her new phone up for everything to come. The delivery men help her carry everything inside and even helps her carry her bedroom items upstairs, and in thanks she tips them $20 each. By the time they leave, Lena is even more hungry than she already was. God, she feels like she could eat as much as Ka-. _She_ just feels like she could eat a horse, that’s all. So, she empties her duffle bag, grabs another stack of cash, meanders her way through the many boxes sitting in her living room and sets off in search of the town once more. 

It’s not as cold today, not quite sunny but not nearly as dreary as it was yesterday, but the walk feels twice as long with nothing in her stomach, even if she’s walking as fast as she possibly can without looking ridiculous. 

She’s just entered the town and is about to immediately run off into the plaza in search of any kind of food when the smell of freshly baked bread nearly knocks her off her feet. Slowly, she looks around her surroundings, and there, tucked into a tiny little corner, lies a bakery called ‘J’s Bakes.’ (She almost snorts at the name but reigns it in at the last moment. J’s Bakes? Seriously?) It looks fairly dingy, the sign faded, the chairs outside worn, but it’s food and at this point Lena would kill for a decent meal, so she heads inside immediately, a bell signalling her arrival. 

The first thing she notices is that it is much nicer inside. It’s well-lit, with at least eight light wooden chairs and tables down the other end of the store, two of which were currently occupied, with a small wall separating the counter and dining areas. Underneath the glass at the counter lies some of the best-looking pastries and sweet treats Lena’s ever seen, although she acknowledges that that may be the hunger talking. 

“Hi there!” A young boy, maybe aged fourteen or fifteen, smiles at her as he stands at the counter, hands clasping the register. “What can we do for you today?” 

Lena has to fight the urge to laugh as the boy’s eyes bulge slightly at the sheer magnitude of her order – two bagels, three sandwiches, their specialty of the day, a large coffee and an entire loaf bread. It’s more than she’d ever usually eat in one sitting, but it had been a long while since she had truly forgotten to eat as Ka-, _as_ she had usually had been given daily reminders to eat. She feels like she’s never been this hungry in her whole entire life. 

“Here you go, ma’am! Have a nice day!” The boy said brightly, a cheery smile on his face as he handed over a bag full of food. 

“Thank you.” Lena says to the young boy, surprising herself when she smiles genuinely back at him. She walks over to one of the tables by the window, sitting down quietly and immediately diving into her breakfast with a gusto even Ka- _anyone_ , anyone would be surprised at. God, it’s definitely not the hunger talking, because the food is every bit as delicious as it looked sitting on the shelves, and it takes everything in Lena not to just shovel it all down in mere seconds. 

“Woah, there, slow down a little. Wouldn’t want you to choke, aye?” A man speaks with a heavy Irish accent, grinning at her from the table directly opposite hers. He’s lily-white, and not much older than Lena herself, with dark hair and an even darker beard, with kind brown eyes and a friendly smile on his lips. He sits relaxed on his chair, leaning back slightly, eating his own sandwich and apparently watching Lena rapidly scoff down her own breakfast. 

“Well, I haven’t choked yet.” She murmurs, finishing her mouthful of bagel and taking another bite, raising an eyebrow as if to say ‘I’m good.’ 

“You like the food here that much then, huh?” The man smiles again, also taking a bite of his own sandwich. 

“More like I haven’t eaten in three days and this is the first place I found that sells food.” She mumbles back, continuing to dive back into her food between words. 

“Ah, too consumed by the moving process to remember to eat?” The man leans back further as he speaks, finishing off his sandwich as he continues to look at her. 

“What?” Lena asks, food temporarily forgotten as she stares back at the man in confusion. 

“You don’t have an accent and I haven’t seen you around before, so you’re clearly not a local, and we don’t get many tourists down this far so I just assumed you’ve moved here?” The man shrugs. Lena eyes the man warily, but he only laughs and rolls his eyes in response. 

“What’s your name, stranger?” The man asks as he gets up from his seat, grabbing the apron that was hanging on the back of his chair. 

“Lena.” She answers curtly, taking a sip of her coffee, still eyeing him. The man only grins more heartily at her response. 

“Well, Lena, I’m Jack. Welcome to our little corner of the world.” 

_Jack._

_Jack, the man she loved. Jack, her friend and closest confidant. Jack, the man who wanted to save the world by her side. Jack, who had always been too kind, too compassionate for his own good. Jack, who loved her in return. Jack, who understood her and Jack who she understood in turn. Jack, who had only ever wanted to help people. Jack, who had never lied to her. Jack, Jack, Jack._

_Jack, the man she sentenced to death for Supergirl’s sake._

At the mere mention of his name, memories of Jack rapidly come flooding back to her. But instead of feeling the pain and the hurt and the misery that is usually associated with reliving her time with Jack, she feels those memories relieve her pain, feels those memories set her free in a way she’s never been set free before. For the first time, it feels like a weight is being lifted off her chest rather than being settled upon her shoulders. For the first time, remembering Jack doesn’t hurt. 

And she knows that she’s only been in Ireland for merely two days, but she can’t help but think it feels something like progress. 

Lena smiles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> way longer chapter than usual, hope it makes sense! the ending to me seems a little rushed but i hope u guys enjoy it regardless, i'm gonna try and update every week so look forward to that!  
> also thank you all so much for the comments and kudos and bookmarks they honestly inspire me so much and i really appreciate them :)


	4. suspicious

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> okay, in this one it's alexs pov, we see sams reaction, we see kara a little bit, and we also pretend that sam knows alex works for the deo cause i cant remember if that happened in the show or not.

It’s been a full 40 hours since Kara had burst into Alex’s office, crying and explaining to her that Lena had gone missing. It’s a been a full 40 hours of trying to calm Kara down, trying to get Kara to explain what happened, looking over any suspicious activity from anyone who’s ever been involved with the youngest Luthor and dealing with another out-of-control anti-alien protest. It’s been a full 40 hours since she clocked into work, and Alex has had no time to eat, no time to destress and most importantly, no time to _sleep._

Sleep at this point feels like a distant memory, an old friend she likes to think about every so often but never actually sees. Sleeps feels like that thing that all your friends recommend all the time but you never end up doing. Sleep feels like something far away, like something that could never happen to you no matter how hard you try. Sleep feels like- 

Okay, point is, Alex is just so goddamned tired. Like, dead-on-her-feet, can-barely-think-straight, about-to-pass-out tired. So when Alex finally stumbles into her apartment during the late morning, she doesn’t even bother removing her uniform and instead just crashes then and there onto her couch. 

But before she can sink into the depths of deep sleep, her phone goes off. A stream of curse-words flood her apartment as she blindly reaches for her phone, slapping the table a few times before finally managing to grasp it. She doesn’t even bother to check who it is – it’s probably another DEO emergency, like it usually is – before accepting the call and holding it up to her ear. 

“What?” She barks. 

“Geez, Alex, no need to bite my head off.” The other voice says, matching Alex’s snarkiness with an ease not too unusual for the brunette on the other line. 

“Hello, Sam. Sorry.” Alex sighs into her phone. 

“Hello to you too, Alex. What’s got you so moody this morning?” Sam asks. 

“Just tired, it’s been a long couple of days. What're you calling for? Not that I don’t appreciate it.” Alex speaks as she gets and begins to make her way to the kitchen to make a cup of coffee. 

“Have you heard from Lena? I’ve been trying to reach her for hours but she isn’t answering her phone and I tried to call Jess but apparently there’s been a ‘situation’ at the National City branch of L-Corp so I can’t get ahold of her either. I mean, Lena’s probably just not answering my calls because she knows that I am so fucking pissed at her right now but I’m also worried about this supposed ‘situation’ that’s happening because over here in Metropolis we’ve been left in the dark completely.” Sam speaks quickly, a little worry evident in her voice. 

Alex immediately becomes alert at the mention of Lena. Although she’d only been missing for 40 or so hours, the fact that she cut ties with the DEO, gave L-Corp away to Jess and hadn’t told anyone including her best friend Kara or her oldest friend Sam what was going on is suspicious enough for Alex to suspect some sort of foul play. 

“Wait, wait, wait. Why are you pissed at Lena? What happened?” Alex questions, eyebrows furrowing, her coffee going forgotten at the potential new information. Sam sighs in exasperation as soon as the words leave Alex’s mouth. 

“Look, I understand that Lena cares for Ruby and I greatly, and I also understand that she expresses her love through the use of copious amounts of money but seriously this is way over-the-top, even for Lena! I mean, I get that she literally has more money than God but she knows how important it is for me to work for what we have and earn my place and not just have everything handed to me! But what does she do? Just transfers over $150 million dollars into my account like it’s nothing and doesn’t even pick up my damn calls! Like, what?” Sam puffs a little at the end of her tirade, clearly more than a little annoyed at what Lena has done. 

Alex’s eyes widen at the new information and immediately races to grab her leather jacket and motorcycle keys, no longer tired in the slightest. 

“Alex? Alex!” Sam yells into her phone. 

“Yeah, sorry, Sam. One moment.” Alex says, taking two steps at a time down the stairs as she races to get to her bike. As soon as she’s cleared the stairs and starts to cross the lobby, she begins speaking. 

“Okay, look, Lena has gone missing. Like completely off the grid. Her main apartment has been emptied out and sold. We’re currently checking through all of her other properties to see if it’s the same. The situation at L-Corp? It’s because Lena gave away L-Corp to Jess, who’s now the new CEO and majority shareholder. If you didn’t know anything, then she didn’t mention anything about doing something like this to any one of us, which leads me to believe that foul play is involved. We're investigating.” Alex explains as quick as she can, keen to get to the DEO and start looking into the new information Sam has given her. 

“A-Alex, what? I don’t understand. What do you mean Lena’s disappeared?” Sam questions her, a slight edge to her voice. Alex sighs, runs a hand through her short hair, and swings a leg over her motorcycle as she quickly turns on the engine. 

“Look, Sam, I have to go. I promise I’ll call you later and explain, okay? Bye!” 

“Alex, no! Wait!” Sam calls out, but Alex quickly hangs up, puts her phone in her pocket, and immediately begins to speed off to the DEO. 

God, _there truly is no rest for the wicked_ , Alex thinks. 

\+ 

The DEO is just as busy as it was when she left just over two hours ago. No stillness to be seen or silence to be heard, just the consistent buzz of agents running around, of theories being shared, of information being exchanged and criminals being brought in. 

Alex absolutely loves it. 

It’s the perfect job for her. It makes her better, faster, stronger and smarter than she was the day before. The pride she has when she brings criminals in or protects someone, the way solving crimes and putting together evidence intellectually challenges her, the thrill she gets when she chases down a suspect or saves a civilian, all of it satisfies her in a way that no other job or lifestyle ever could. Even if it means she often has to abandon her plans or sacrifice her precious, precious sleep. 

Agents nod to her – not at all surprised that she’s back so soon, not when they’re all so used to the director’s tendency to over-work – as she strides confidently towards the control center, eyes scanning over the area in search of that familiar red cape that her sister wears, frowning slightly when she can’t find it. 

Kara had been more than distraught at the thought of Lena having seemingly disappeared, but understandably worried considering the CEO’s track record when it came to having numerous assassination attempts on her life, being frequently kidnapped, being framed for various different crimes and receiving death threats from not only those who hated the Luthor name or Lena herself, but also from her family. Plus, with the various state secrets that Lena had been privy to in her time working with the DEO and her general knowledge of technology and science, Lena’s whereabouts and suspect disappearance had automatically become a concern for the secret organization, even if Kara hadn’t been devasted, half-hysterical and confused beyond belief with the news. 

After Kara burst into her office crying on Sunday, Alex had somehow managed to calm her down for a little while and ask her what happened. And to be honest, the information Kara had given her wasn’t adding up. L-Corp had been given to Jess completely, shares and ownership and all. CatCo had been rather suddenly sold to Andrea Rojas, another CEO, very quickly and quietly. Lena had cut ties with the DEO completely the morning of her disappearance. Lena’s apartment had been fully cleaned out, all the furniture and all of Lena’s personal items had been removed and the apartment was for sale. And now, apparently, Lena had transferred over $150 million dollars into Sam’s bank account. 

For all intents and purposes, Lena was seemingly completely off the grid, but the question was what’s going on? 

Lena hadn’t mentioned any of this to any one of her friends, not even Sam, which made Alex think that whatever happened was sudden. But then, apparently it was not that sudden, if Lena had time to organize the documents needed to give L-Corp over to Jess and time to completely clean out her apartment and put the place up for sale. Which again was odd, as it seemed like Lena assumed that wherever she was taken she would be held there for a long time, like she had no faith that she’d be found. The fact that she’d cut ties with the DEO could point to a possible anti-alien group kidnapping her, but kidnappers don’t usually allow the person that they’re kidnapping to get their affairs in order, especially when anti aliens groups are typically not the most patient. 

Alex was going around in circles, it seemed. She didn’t have enough information to put the clues together. 

But if there was one thing she was sure in this case, it was that Lena hadn’t left of her own free will. Lena would never willingly give up on anything, let alone her life here, with the important work she was doing at both L-Corp and the DEO and with the close friends and tight-knit family she had found within all of them. But even above all of that, Alex knew with absolute certainty that Lena would never have willingly left Kara, no matter what had happened between them. 

\+ 

“Brainy!” Alex yelled from the middle of the communications center, striding toward him purposefully. 

“Yes, Director Danvers?” Brainy answered, eyes glued to the screen in front of him. 

“Have you found anything new regarding Lena’s disappearance?” 

“I have a list of all the Luthors’ properties, and Supergirl is checking them out currently as we speak, but other than that, no. We’re still trying to figure out the passcode in order to access her phone.” Brainy replies, still looking at his screen. 

“How many properties?” Alex asks. 

“73 in total, in all seven continents and in 14 different countries.” 

“Hm. Okay. I need you to check Lena’s bank account for me.” Alex commands. 

“Anything in particular I should take note of?” Brainy asks, fingers typing quickly as he begins to search. 

“Recent transactions and transfers, please.” 

Alex watches over Brainy’s shoulders as he types rapidly on his computer, trying to gain access to Lena’s account. This goes on for a few minutes, until Brainy stops and looks confusedly at his screen. 

“This is strange.” Brainy notes. 

“What? What did you find?” Alex questions him. 

“I have found... nothing, Director. Lena Luthor’s official bank account does not exist, as of approximately 48 hours ago.” Brainy states. 

“What? How can that be?” Alex furrows her eyebrows in confusion. 

“How can what be?” Kara questions as she flies into the command center, cape flowing behind her, voice still slightly emotional. This Kara is strikingly different to the Kara who was miserable and crying into Alex’s arms over Lena’s disappearance not even a full day ago. This Kara is also strikingly different to the ‘heroic-in-every-sense-of-the-word' Supergirl version of Kara, who was diligent and firm yet still optimistic and bright no matter what happens. The Kara in front of her right now though? Well. She was a version of Kara that Alex had only seen a few times in all their years. This Kara was the one who carried the weight of a dead civilization on her shoulders, the Kara who used to be so angry all the time at this new world she was forced into, the Kara who would pick fights and disobey rules on purpose just to feel something, the Kara that had laser-focus - not to serve and protect - but in order to point out flaws and weaknesses, in order to get the mission she set for herself done, even at the risk of others. This Kara emulated the calculated mind of her father, the scathing words that her mother used and the driven, militaristic mind of her aunt. 

This was no longer Kara Danvers, mild-mannered human being. Nor was it Supergirl, savior, protector and champion of Earth. No, this was Kara _Zor-El_ , the last true survivor of Krypton, a queen in her own right. 

(Kara had once mentioned that Lena said that loss does strange things to her family. Well, loss does strange things to Alex’s family, too.) 

Alex sighs as she runs a hand through her short hair, eying her sister worriedly. She knows that Kara cares about Lena more than almost anything else, that Lena is one of the best friends Kara has ever had, that they’d been practically inseparable since the moment they met, that they share a kind of bond that Alex has rarely seen before. She knows that Kara is more than very distraught by Lena’s disappearance, that her sister is more than worried that something bad might happen to Lena, but to see her like this, to witness her sister exhibit the same behaviors she did when she lost her family, her culture and her entire planet over the fact that Lena is missing? 

Well, it makes Alex think that maybe Kara and Lena were more than just fr-. 

_No_ , Alex thinks, _not possible_. There has to be another explanation as to why Kara was acting like this. Alex would’ve known way before this all happened if it were true. Kara would have told her. 

( _Right?_ Kara would’ve told her, _right?_ ) 

“Did you search all the properties?” Alex asks, shaking her head and focusing back on the case. 

“Yes, all 73 of them. They’re empty, being prepared to be sold. What were you guys doing before I got back?” 

“Director Danvers had me check Lena’s bank account for any suspicious transactions, but we discovered shortly that Lena’s account has been removed or deleted off the mainframe of the bank entirely.” Brainy answers before Alex can even get a word in. 

“Sam called me earlier, asking if I had heard from Lena. Apparently, Lena transferred $150 million dollars into Sam’s bank account before she went missing. I thought it could be a lead, but it looks like we’ve both hit dead-ends.” Alex fills in, still continuously eying her sister, watching her closely. 

Kara’s reaction to the news is more stilted and imperturbable then Alex was expecting, considering the mess Kara was not even two full days ago. Whereas before Kara was crying, sobbing, head filled with a cacophony of thoughts over the news of Lena being missing, all Kara does now is give a mere twitch of the eye and a stony, stoic nod before she turns suddenly and flies straight out of the DEO. 

Alex sighs, the worry for her sister evident on her face, and turns to speak to Brainy. 

“Keep looking into the anti-alien group angle for Lena, and maybe start going over her whereabouts for the past month. I want every location she went, what time she went, what she did while she was out, who she spoke to and what she spoke about. _Anything_ is a potential clue, okay Brainy?” 

“Yes, Director Danvers.” Brainy nods, already beginning his search. 

Alex begins to walk away from the hustle and bustle of the command center, feeling sick as heavy concern for both Lena – who she’d only really just began to consider a close friend – and Kara – who was very obviously distressed by the entire situation – settles in her stomach. 

However, right before Alex fully leaves the room, she turns around and commands: 

“And Brainy, let me know immediately when you find something. That’s an order.” 

\+ 

Alex is not even one step inside of her apartment - door barely shut closed behind her, jacket only half shrugged off, keys still clutched in her hand - when her phone lights up with a call, Sam’s name and a photo of her and Ruby smiling popping up on her screen. Alex can only sigh tiredly as she drops her keys into the bowl beside her door and swipes right to answer to the call, Sam’s voice immediately coming through. 

“Alex Danvers, what the hell do you mean that Lena has gone missing?” 

Alex only sighs louder, dropping onto her couch with a huff, settling in for what is bound to be a long conversation with a fair amount of yelling on Sam’s side of things. Sam has always been overprotective of Lena, after all. There’s bound to be yelling. 

“Lena’s just... gone, Sam. She gave away $150 million dollars to you, and now her bank account is void. She transferred L-Corp completely over to Jess, shares and all. She sold CatCo to another CEO completely. Every single property she or the Luthors have ever owned is empty and for sale, including her main apartment here in National City. We’ve all been left in the dark. Not even Kara has any clue what the hell is going on, and Kara is her goddamned best friend. She also hadn’t mentioned any type of trouble she was in or threats she was receiving to us, so at the moment we have absolutely no leads. There’s nothing to track or trace her with at all, Sam. She’s just completely off the radar.” Alex recaps, exhaustion and confusion coloring her voice. 

“How could she just be gone, Alex? She’s arguably one of the most famous people in the world, surely someone has seen her!” and yep, there’s the yelling. 

“The public doesn’t know she’s missing yet, which means we don’t know if anyone’s seen her yet, Sam. It’s still early stages right now.” Alex speaks, rubbing a hand over her face. 

“What about her phone, or security cameras or-” 

“Sam.” Alex says loudly, interrupting her friend. 

“Look, I understand that you’re worried for Lena, we all are, Sam, and I promise you, we are searching as much as we can, and we will find her. But right now, there’s not much we can do but wait until we find new leads. You just need to stay calm, and let us do our job, okay? We’re gonna find her, Sam. I promise.” Alex gently tries to assure and assuage her friend’s concerns. 

“I just... I'm just scared Alex, Lena’s been attacked and hurt and kidnapped so many times before... what if this time she doesn’t make it back?” Sam asks, fear vividly present in her voice. 

“Sam. Sam, you can’t think like that, okay? We don’t know what’s going on, and those what-ifs are just going to make things worse. You just... you just have to believe that she’s going to come out of this relatively okay.” 

“Alex, I just... She’s my family, Alex. I just need her to come back, to be safe with us again.” Sam’s voice breaks, desperation clear in her words. 

“I know, Sam, I know. But I promise you, we will find her.” 

And now, Sam knows that Alex is trying to comfort her, trying to alleviate her concerns and fears for Lena even just a little bit, trying to help feel even just the smallest bit better, but all the constant reassurance does is make Sam feel like the entire situation is far, _far worse_ than they think. But all the strange, suspicious evidence of Lena’s disappearance that Alex provided her with does is make Sam worry ten times more because the evidence makes her head swirl with conflicting thoughts and feelings. 

Conflicting thoughts and feelings like perhaps... perhaps the question isn’t whether or not Alex can find Lena, but whether or not Lena wants to be found.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope u guys liked it! updating a little earlier than normal this week so i hope you enjoy! your comments and kudos really have inspired me and i cant wait to continue to write this story so thank you :)
> 
> as always, this is not beta read so just let me know if i make any mistakes.
> 
> stay safe!


	5. can't stop thinking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in this chapter there is no real plot, just a look in kara's head and kara's relationship with alex a little.

Kara can’t stop thinking about the last time she saw Lena. 

About the way she swung the bottle of wine over her shoulder. 

About the way she moved. 

About the words she said. 

About the expressions that crossed her face. 

About the way she smiled. 

About the way she looked at Kara. 

About the way she said ‘always’. 

Kara just can’t stop thinking about the fact that those moments, those memories, may have been the last time she ever saw Lena, the last memories of her best friend that Kara will ever have. 

And Kara knows, _she knows_ that it’s not even been two days yet since they discovered that Lena was missing. She knows that she has to hold out hope, has to believe that they’ll find Lena alive and relatively unscathed. She knows that she has to stay positive, that she cannot neglect her other duties just to focus on Lena. She knows that she has to continue to be National City’s beacon of hope, to continue to be the inspiring and bright hero the city knows her to be. 

She knows that she has to believe everything will be okay. 

But it’s so hard to hold onto those beliefs when her mind is just screaming _‘Lena, Lena, Lena’_ on a loop of every moment of every day. 

She saves civilians from a fire? She thinks of all the times she’s saved Lena, and wonders if she can save her this time, too. 

She walks past Noonan’s? She thinks of the many, many lunches she shared with Lena over the years. All the times she had to cancel on her, all the times she actually managed to make it there, all the time spent together. 

She flies into the DEO? She thinks of all the times Lena’s worked with them in order to save the world from whatever calamity was occurring at the time. She thinks of how Lena put her life on the line to do what was right. She thinks of Lena, always working to make the world a better place, no matter what. 

She walks into CatCo? She thinks of how close Lena used to be to her – mere footsteps, everyday - and how far away she could be right now. She thinks of giving Lena that planner on her first day. She thinks of all the interviews she did with Lena, the way they developed their friendship through them. 

She flies past L-Corp? She thinks of Lena working tirelessly to restore her family name and erase Lex’s sins. She thinks of all the times she’s caught Lena asleep at her desk. She thinks of all the time they spent on their couch. She thinks of saving Lena again and late night visits as her alternate identity. She thinks of Lena again, still always trying to make the world a better place, no matter where she goes. 

She goes home? She thinks of Lena, spread out on Kara’s couch, watching all the movies that Lena never saw due to her Luthor upbringing. She thinks of Lena, vulnerable and unguarded only in front of Kara, in soft and comfortable clothes, safe in the warmth of Kara’s apartment. She wonders if Lena is safe wherever she’s been taken. She wonders if she’ll ever see Lena in her apartment again. 

She puts on her Supergirl suit? She thinks of the fact that she may never get to tell Lena the truth. She thinks about how Lena would react. She thinks about what she would say to Lena if she were here, beside Kara. She thinks of how badly she wants Lena to be here, even if it was just to yell and scream at Kara for her betrayal. She wonders if maybe Lena would still be in National City, safe, if she had told Lena about her being Supergirl earlier. 

Kara just... Kara just thinks about Lena all the time, and Kara just wants Lena back home again, with her, where she belongs, no matter what it takes. 

(Kara keeps thinking that maybe _this_ will be the time she can’t save Lena.) 

But Kara knows that thinking about Lena _(always, constantly thinking of her)_ won’t do her any good. So if she can’t hold onto her usual belief that everything will be okay, if she can’t hold onto the side of herself that is optimistic about any situation, then she has to hold onto her faith. She has to hold onto the faith that Lena can protect herself, the faith that Kara will complete the mission and bring Lena back home safe. 

So Kara relies solely on that faith and focuses completely on the mission: finding Lena. 

She listens dutifully as Brainy tells her about of each of the 73 Luthor properties, speeding around the world as fast as she can in order to get to the locations. She takes her time whilst searching all of the homes - does it as professionally as she can, dutifully looking in every nook and cranny, pulling candlestick holders (Luthors’ tend to love their secret hideouts, after all) and using her x-ray vision to go over the house in case she’s missed something. 

She doesn’t snap when they find the majority of houses are completely empty, already on the market and ready to be sold any moment. She doesn’t feel the usual hope when a few of the houses have lead-lined rooms and she doesn’t cry or anger when those lead-lined rooms are empty. She searches every inch of the few houses that are not fully cleaned out yet and feels only frustrated when she finds no clues to Lena’s whereabouts. She goes back to the DEO dutifully when Brainy tells her there’s no more houses to search. 

But when Alex tells her that they’ve exhausted all of the very few leads that they have, Kara stops functioning. She stops thinking about how she probably needs to make an appearance at work, how she probably needs to rest, to eat and sleep, how she probably needs to think a little less of Lena’s face (and her laugh and her smile and her eyes and her-) and a little more about where Lena’s been taken and how to find her. She stops thinking about the mission and her faith in herself and the complete turmoil her emotions are in and she - 

Kara stops all of those thoughts, flies out of the DEO without a word, shoots straight up into the sky and just _lets go._

Her fear, concern, anger, worry, shame, regret, loss, she lets go of all of it with a laser beam that tears through the sky, red hot light blasting through the clouds as far as she can manage. The pure heat that erupts from her eyes like lava from a volcano evaporates the tears that manage to leak through, light steam coming forth in its stead. Her whole body shakes – trembles – with the raw force she puts behind the laser beam as she continues to shoot up high into the sky. 

She doesn’t realize she’s screaming until her throat starts to ache. She can usually hear everything that is around her - every heartbeat, every conversation, every inhale and exhale of breath - but here, surrounded in the depths of her emotions and hurtling upwards, it’s like everything is muted, silenced, quiet and without clarity in a way Kara hasn’t experienced in a long while. 

She lets everything out in the anguished scream torn from her throat and the white-hot laser-beam bursting from her eyes. 

And then, when she’s just about to breach Earth’s atmosphere, she stops flying and lets gravity do the work for her, falling back downward. 

Down, down, down she goes. The wind rushes past her violently, her body slicing through the clouds like easily, heat surrounds her like a meteor, her scream still cutting through the air, the lasers fired from her eyes reaching far up into space as she crashes toward the Earth, similar to the way she had done so many years ago now. Except this time, there is no pod to protect her, just the elements of this planet that can barely even pierce her skin surrounding her descent. 

She hits the ocean with a boom that pierces the silence around her like a mighty clap of lightening, her echoing scream reverberating through the air like thunder. 

And still, she goes further, down and down until she can’t see the sun or the sky anymore, deeper until the inky blackness of the ocean is the only thing that accompanies her, and then still, she goes deeper. 

And then when she’s as far as she can go, she sits, cross-legged and floating in the midst of the water. Her lungs are exhausted, her throat sore. Her eyes are still glowing red with power, still burning with the leftover heat from the laser-beams. Her whole body sits on the teetering edge between just having enough power left or solar-flaring. Her ears strain and struggle with the silence that envelops her. 

She sits there, in the bottom of the ocean, and lets herself breathe properly for the first time since the words _Lena_ and _disappearing_ fell upon her ears. 

\+ 

When Kara finally surfaces from depths of the ocean, it’s dusk. The sun just barely sits above the skyline, the last of its pale yellow light glimmering on the water, its weakened glow hitting her skin and restoring some of the power she’d wasted earlier, allowing Kara to skim the water as she floats back to shore. 

She does not bother to fly back to the DEO or her apartment. There’s no point. She already knows that by now Alex has tracked her down and is simply waiting for Kara to fly to her. She can already hear Alex’s heartbeat - strong but going slightly faster than usual with the worry she’s feeling - on the shore-break closest to Kara’s position. 

She flies as slow as possible to delay the inevitable – a strong lecture about coping mechanisms that Alex got straight from Kelly and even stronger reassurances about finding Lena – but eventually has to float down next to where Alex is sitting, a rented DEO car not that far behind her. 

They both sit beside each other and yet facing forward, eyes both locked directly on the setting of the sun before them. 

“I don’t want to talk about it.” Is the first thing Kara says after hearing the sharp breath Alex took, an indicator of her beginning her concerned speech. 

“Too bad,” Alex replies. “We’re going to talk about it anyways.” 

“I’ll just fly away, then.” Kara stubbornly countered. 

“We both know you can’t,” Alex hums. “You almost blew your powers, you couldn’t make it back to National City even if you tried.” 

“Where are we, anyways?” Kara deflects. 

“Somewhere along the coast, an hour or so’s drive from home.” 

Kara just nods in response, watching the sun dip lower behind the ocean. 

“It’s been a long time since I’ve had to come out and find you like this, Kara.” Alex begins, eyes shifting over to Kara’s hunched shoulders. 

Kara doesn’t reply. 

“You remember the first time? Mom almost had a stroke when you floated out of the water. Threatened to ground us both until we were thirty.” Alex continues. 

“Lucky she’s not here this time, then, I guess.” Kara said, eyes still forward on the lowering sun. 

“Dad tried so hard to teach you about proper coping mechanisms. Breathing, focusing on certain sounds, counting backwards, all that stuff. But every time – whenever you felt homesick or were overwhelmed or got angry - you’d just go straight back to throwing yourself in the deepest darkest corner of the ocean for as many hours as it took.” Alex barrels on. 

And Kara sighs, because she already knows where this particular lecture is heading. 

“And we’d all sit there - me and Mom and Dad – and we’d just shrug because you’d lost your entire planet and as much as we didn’t want you using your powers, we couldn’t control how you worked through your grief.” Alex chances a look at Kara, watching her as she curls in on herself further. 

“So today, when you were all stoic, _I thought maybe Kara’s just not dealing with her stress properly_. I mean, I know how busy we’ve been with all the Supergirl and saving the world stuff, and I know you’ve been trying to put more work into your articles lately, and I know you’ve been trying to look after all of us after everything that’s happened, so I figured that Lena disappearing was kinda the last straw. You’ve been running ragged lately, Kar, and I know that losing Lena at such a tough time is a hard blow.” Alex pauses to take a breath. 

“I thought you were just feeling stressed about everything going on in both of your lives, and that the stoic façade was a way to deal with that. But Kar, I have only ever seen you use this – the flying-as-high-as-you-can-to-get-away and then the dive-bombing-into-the-ocean-as-low-as-you-can - coping mechanism when you were still dealing with the loss of your planet, the loss of your people, the loss of everything you ever knew.” 

“Alex, don’t.” Kara warns, finally turning to face her sister. But Alex is staring resolutely towards to sunset. 

“But today, Kara, this isn’t about the loss of your family or your culture or your planet. Today, Kara, this is about Len-.” 

“Stop, Alex.” Kara speaks louder this time, teeth gritted. 

“And I know that Lena is especially important to you, Kara - we all know it - but I just can’t understand why you’re reacting this way about her disappeara-” 

“Alex.” Kara urges again, cutting her sister off. But Alex is not deterred and carries on regardless. 

“It’s only been two days. We’re going to find her, Kar, it’s going to be okay. So just-just talk to me, tell me what’s going on.” Alex pleads a little, turning to finally face her sister for the first time during the whole conversation. But Kara has already turned back to the sun, looking away from her sister once more. 

“I don’t want to talk about it.” Kara repeats. 

“Too bad, Kar.” Alex repeats. “We need to talk at some point, might as well be now.” 

They sit in silence for a moment before Kara speaks. 

“You were wrong.” She says. 

“About what?” Alex questions. 

“About me not being able to fly away.” Kara says, wind and sand combining and rushing past Alex immediately as Kara speeds away, quicker than Alex can even blink. 

Alex’s curses follow Kara all the way home. 

(So do thoughts of Lena.) 

\+ 

Instead of the sun, it is the ever-bright moon – surrounded by the millions of stars burning as vividly as ever despite the smog of the city trying to cover them up – that Kara looks up at now, having been home for hours after her conversation with Alex. 

Since she’d flown back to National City, she’d stopped 3 muggings, 4 attempted assaults, a bank robbery, an attempted home invasion and handled one of the more violent anti-alien protests that were running rampant through the city. But she feels none of the usual thrill of stopping crime - of saving people - but instead her mind flips back and forth between thoughts of Lena and thoughts of what Alex was trying to say to her. 

She tries to distract herself with catching up on her forgotten CatCo work, researching ideas for new articles and finishing old ones up to send off to be edited. She tries to distract herself with Netflix, looking to watch something that doesn’t remind her of anything else. She tries to distract herself with ordering food, focusing on her favorite flavors and meals. She tries to distract herself with anything else, desperate to not think about Lena or Alex. 

But it works to no avail. 

She does want to talk about what’s going on, really, she does. Her mind is jumbled and she doesn’t really understand what’s going on within herself anyways but god, she wants - _needs_ \- to just let it all out. And she knows, she knows that she really should talk to Alex about it, that Alex has always understood her even when Kara hasn’t understood herself. She knows from her experiences with Alex’s alcohol problems that keeping things bottled up is only going to lead her down a worse path. But it’s like something is stopping her from speaking out aloud, like there’s a weight on her chest that is physically blocking the words from coming out. 

No matter how much she wants to talk about it, she can’t. She just isn’t capable of it right now. That’s why she went back to her oldest coping mechanism, the one that got her through the toughest moments of her life. 

She just doesn’t know how to deal with this. Any of it at all. 

So when she hears Alex’s heartbeat outside of her apartment door, she prepares herself for the worst. She prepares herself for another lengthy conversation, full of things that Kara either doesn’t understand herself or is unable to talk about. She prepares herself for a getaway excuse, sirens in the distance or a person crying out for help, just in case it becomes too much for her to handle again. She prepares herself for Alex’s concerned, worried glances, for the fretting over Kara’s wellbeing, for the pleading tone of the voice. 

But Alex just lets herself in quietly, shrugging off her jacket, placing her keys and a box of donuts on the table in front of Kara, and settles down on the couch next to her. The TV plays a show that Kara’s never seen before, and no sirens or screams reach her ears in the silence that follows Alex’s entrance. Kara looks at the donuts and then at Alex. 

“I’m always gonna be here for you, Kara. Even if you fly away from me.” Alex murmurs seriously, placing a supportive hand on Kara’s shoulder. 

"Thank you, Alex." Kara says back, mouth full of donut already.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry if this is bad, the ending feels rushed to me but i really struggled with how i wanted to end this chapter so this is what i ended up with. also sorry this is a day late, again really struggled with this chapter. but i hope you guys enjoy and once more thanks for all your kudos and comments they mean the world to me :)

**Author's Note:**

> first fic in ages, heres praying it actually goes well. sorry if my writing isnt good, im a little out of practice but hopefully as this story progresses ill get better. enjoy!


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